Tell Me Your Sweet Love Hasn't Died
by awesomesausome
Summary: One shot, post- Willie Pete. He wants to stop hurting her.


I'm still working on my other story, but I just had to get this out. The title is a line from "You were always on my mind." And yeah. It's post-Willie Pete, so heads up, there be spoilers.

Disclaimer: I don't own the characters.

* * *

He tells Nina not to feel guilty. That they didn't do anything wrong. He's not in a relationship, he's not going behind anyone's back, they are two consenting adults and there was nothing improper about what they did.

Except.

Except, well, Nina heard the voicemail. The voicemail that should have been heard by Mackenzie, and only Mackenzie, and the one that he stubbornly refuses to tell her about. The one that when she asked about, albeit repeatedly, he practically bit her head off.

"You're not as cute as you think you are." She had looked hurt, like he knew she would, and it had given him only a surge of vindictive pleasure before he felt awful about being the one to put that look on her face. (Plus, and he wouldn't admit this out loud of course, but she was as cute as she thought she was. But he was feeling guilty about not telling her what was in a message that had been left for her, that was hers, essentially, and he was always good at twisting guilt into misdirected anger.)

So Nina heard the voicemail, and she insisted that he was still in love with Mac (which he was) while he insisted that it was the drugs talking and not him (which was a lie), and somehow that had ended in a date which had ended at his apartment.

And of course Mac calls. Of course she does. That was the exact kind of timing she had always had (like when she told him about the affair right after he made an appointment at a jewelry store to look at engagement rings). Just when he had his mind on something else, someone else, she had to call and push everything and everyone out again (although, and again this is something he would never say out loud, but let's be honest, she's never far out of his mind. "You're Always On My Mind" might as well have been written about her).

"I should have known better," is what Nina says in response when she walks over to him and runs a hand across his back. "This is messy. I should have known better than to get myself involved in something messy. I _did_ know better." But he was persistent, partly, he thinks (he knows) to prove that he's not in love with Mackenzie anymore.

"It's not messy," Will insists. "We're not doing anything wrong. Mackenzie and I are over." (And he pretends that he doesn't feel that sharp pain that rips through him when he says that).

"Does Mackenzie know that?" Nina asks.

"She does, yes." (Does she? He doesn't know how she feels because he won't tell her what the voicemail says, and yes, he knows that makes him a coward, but he regretted leaving that message, and then the message was magically deleted, and he's not one to look a gift horse in the mouth).

"Do you know that?" Nina wonders and he doesn't answer.

* * *

Mackenzie finds out about Nina because Will is an idiot, and if he felt guilty about sleeping with her in the first place it's nothing compared to how he feels when he realizes that he's hurt Mac, really, really hurt her.

He makes a date with Nina, a second date, and decides to take her to his favorite little Greek restaurant. He raves about the baklava the whole way to the restaurant, and it's only when they're seated that he hears a sharp intake of breath and turns to see Mackenzie two tables down from them.

It's then that he remembers that he first found out about this place because it was _Mac_'_s_ favorite Greek restaurant. (But really, the universe is just toying with him, because what are the odds that Mac is going to be here, at the same time?)

To make matters worse, and infinitely more complicated, Mackenzie is sitting with none other than her father, Sir Edward McHale, who had always been a huge fan of Will's, but who, with his daughter obviously upset, wished that Will had gone somewhere, anywhere, but that particular restaurant with a date.

Nina, to her credit, looks uncomfortable with the situation, and gives a polite smile to Mackenzie who manages to give a small wave in return.

"Shit," Will mutters under his breath, and he pretends he doesn't notice that Mackenzie looks devastated. (Of course he notices. And he thought that he would feel good about that, about ripping out her heart the way that she had ripped out his, but instead it makes him feel cold and empty. His happiness is, somehow, unfairly, irrevocably tied to hers.)

Mac and her father finish up their meal, and on the way out, Sir Edward offers his hand out to Will and tells him,

"It's good to see you," and adds, "I'm proud of the work you and my Mackenzie are doing," just to make things a little bit worse.

After they leave, Nina says, "That was her father, wasn't it?" and then, "God, I'm an asshole."

"It's none of my business," is the first thing Mackenzie says when he arrives at her office the next morning. "You're an adult, and I have no say over what you do or do not do." But she looks like she had a rough night, and he wants nothing more than to tug her into his arms and promise her that he'll stop trying to constantly hurt her. But he can't, because he's a prick, and he thinks she knows that. (And one of these days she's going to get tired of him being such a prick, especially to her, and she's going to move on, once and for all, and it will break him.)

"Nina and I are dating," he says, and Mackenzie flinches like the words have physically hit her. "I should have told you, and I shouldn't have taken her to eat there."

"You didn't need to tell me," Mac insists. "I'm happy for you." (Which is a lie, of course, they both know that.)

He shouldn't be surprised when he goes in for the rundown meeting and Don's leading it instead, but he is.

"Where the hell is Mackenzie?" He asks.

"She got sick, something she ate maybe? She asked me to fill in," Don replies, and Will sinks into the chair and feels sick himself.

* * *

"I can't stop hurting her," he tells Dr. Habib, who, as usual, has no answers for him.

After his therapy session (which is a total waste of time), he wanders around until he finds himself in front of Mackenzie's apartment building in midtown. He's ignored two calls from Nina (she left a voicemail on the second one asking him a tight, polite voice to call him back. He feels slightly bad about involving Nina in the whole thing, but he also feels like she knew what she was getting herself into. She should have never believed him when he said he wasn't still in love with Mac), a couple from Charlie, and one from Jim, still in New Hampshire. The one from Jim catches his attention, and he listens to the voicemail.

"Hey Will, it's Jim. I know I shouldn't talk, seeing how messy my own life is right now, but I just got off the phone with Mac, and I don't know what's going on, and it's probably not really my place, and you might fire me, but I've been through a lot with her, and I just…I think it's my duty as her friend to tell you that you're being a real douchebag." There's a pause, and then Jim says, "Gather ye rosebuds, Will. While ye may. And yeah, that's all. Stop hurting her, man."

Will's strangely proud of the kid, and wonders what in the hell Mac said to him on the phone.

Gather ye rosebuds.

He recognizes it immediately as one of Mackenzie's favorite poems, and damn it, it's not as if he doesn't want to gather ye rosebuds.

Nina calls him again, and this time he answers, standing in the middle of the sidewalk outside of Mackenzie's apartment.

"We're done, right?" Nina asks. In another life, one where he didn't belong so completely to Mackenzie McHale, he might have really hit it off with Nina Howard.

"I'm sorry," he responds.

"I know. Just. Tell her what was in the voicemail, okay? Stop kidding yourself." She hangs up on him and he shoves his phone in his pocket and rocks back on his heels once before propelling himself forward and into the lobby of her building.

* * *

When Mackenzie pulls open the door to let him in, she doesn't say anything.

"Mac," he starts. "It's over with Nina Howard." Her eyebrows rise in surprise, but she still doesn't say anything. "I'm sorry."

Mackenzie shakes her head.

"You're allowed to date," she tells him, but it's his turn to shake his head.

"'I'm not just saying this because I'm high," he begins. "If the answer is no, then don't call me back, or bring it up, or anything. I have to tell you; I mean after tonight, I really want to tell you that I never stopped loving you.'" He finishes and looks at her expectantly.

"You're an idiot," she finally says.

"There was more after that. I mixed up Obama and Bin Laden again," he admits. "But that was the most important part."

"You did remember."

"Of course I did."

"Why did you take Nina Howard out on a date?"

"Two dates." (If they're going to do this, they're going to do it right, and that means total honesty, right from the start. And he knows this, but it still doesn't make him feel better when Mac's eyes narrow and she glares at him).

"What?"

"We went on two dates, you know what? It doesn't matter. I took Nina Howard out on a date…"

"Apparently two dates," Mac interrupts.

"I took Nina Howard out on _two _dates to convince both her and myself that I didn't still love you, that I said what I did on the voicemail because of the drugs and the emotional high of the night, and that's bullshit." He takes a step towards her, and she doesn't back away, which he takes as a win.

"You've never stopped loving me?"

"Nope. Not even a little. Loving you was never the problem."

"Right. You still haven't forgiven me. That's the problem," Mackenzie nods, and wraps her arms around herself, something she did when she was feeling particularly vulnerable, and he doesn't talk himself out of it this time, and instead reaches for her and pulls her in for a hug.

She's tense, at first, and then she relaxes slightly, melting into his arms. (She always did fit perfectly in his arms. Like she was designed to fit there, slide right in, complete him.)

"I'm not there yet," Will admits. "I still have some anger that I'm working on, but I promise you that I am trying. I want to stop hurting you. I thought it would feel good, but it feels terrible, and I just…I'm trying really hard. Can that be enough for now?"

Mackenzie pulls away, and he can see that she's crying, and he swipes a thumb across her cheek.

"It's enough," she reassures. "For now."

* * *

He forgives her without noticing.

When he thinks back and tries to figure out the exact moment that he stops being so angry with her, he can't.

They aren't perfect. They fight, and he's still not great at completely trusting her, but he loves her and she loves him, and that's enough.

And when he wakes up and she's curled around him, her head tucked under his chin, and their legs tangled together, he knows that he's never been this happy.

He runs into Nina Howard three weeks after he and Mackenzie are officially back together, and he's apprehensive for a moment, but she gives him a smile and offers a genuine congratulations.

"I heard through the grapevine that you and Mackenzie are back together," Nina says.

"Off the record?" Will double checks. "Yes."

"Good." She reaches up and presses a kiss to his cheek. "I never stood a chance." She gives him a smile and squeezes his hand. "Good to see you, Will. Give my love to Mackenzie."

And he does. He hurries home and finds Mackenzie curled up on his couch reading over some notes, and he drops a kiss onto her smiling lips.

"What was that for?" She asks, and he just shrugs and lifts her legs up so that he can slide underneath them.

"Nina Howard says hello," he replies.


End file.
